JACKSON – David G. Atwood II will serve at least five years in prison after pleading guilty Friday in federal court to enticement of a minor and wire fraud.

Atwood, 21, 5290 Fisher Ferry Road, appeared before U.S. District Court Judge David Bramlette who will formally impose a sentence June 13, if not earlier. A trial in the case had been set to begin Monday.

According to prosecutors, Atwood, who ran for constable in Warren County and once filed to seek the office of sheriff, used America Online, and Internet service, to communicate using “instant messages” from November 2003 until at least June 2004 with a person he had reason to believe was a 15-year-old boy and to arrange a meeting for sex.

U.S. Attorney Harold Brittain told Bramlette that Atwood also used fraudulent information to establish six credit-card accounts on which he spent $30,076.29 in travel expenses.

Atwood faced between 5 and 30 years on the enticement charge and a fine of up to $250,000. For wire fraud, he faced up to 30 years in prison and a fine of up to $1 million.

By the plea agreement presented in court, Atwood will be sentenced to at least the minimum term of five years on the enticement conviction and may be ordered to pay restitution for losses to the credit-card companies, Brittain said.

Sentencing guidelines for federal judges have existed since the 1980s but their use was made optional by the Supreme Court earlier this year.

Bramlette ordered a pre-sentence report to be prepared and set sentencing for 10:30 a.m. on June 13, or, at the request of Jerry Campbell’s, Atwood’s attorney, at the earliest possible time following completion of the report.

Atwood has been in jail in Madison County since his arrest on the charges in July 2004. Bramlette had refused to release him on bail after a four-hour hearing last month.

Atwood’s guilty pleas were to two of eight counts against him in an indictment that was returned in December by federal grand jurors in Jackson. The indictment also accused him of sending across state lines a threatening message and of five other counts of wire fraud for the five other credit-card accounts it says he established.

The indictment quotes the threatening message as having read, “that little house you have is gonna be burnt to the ground and one night as you walk out to your vehicle i am gonna be waiting there with a knife and I am gonna slice you from your belly to your throat.”

Though minimal credit is given to inmates who serve “good time,” no parole exists in the federal prison system, Bramlette said.

The convictions are for felony crimes, meaning that in addition to serving time in prison Atwood will lose his right to vote in elections, serve on a jury, run for public office or to possess a firearm for any reason, Bramlette said.

In the plea deal Atwood also waived his right to appeal his guilty pleas or the sentences he is to receive on them, Brittain added.

Copies of electronic messages obtained from Atwood’s computer show that he knew he was violating Mississippi law by enticing a person 15 or younger while he was at least three years older than that person, Brittain said.

The credit-card application Atwood admitted was fraudulent was for a Citibank Shell card account. To establish the account he sent wire communications through a computer server in either South Dakota or Nevada.

The investigation that resulted in Friday’s pleas was conducted by the Warren County Sheriff’s Department, the FBI and the federal Joint Antiterrorism Task Force.